by Grant Rodgers, The Des Moines Register

by Grant Rodgers, The Des Moines Register

DES MOINES, Iowa -- A suburban Des Moines police chief on Wednesday defended a controversial search of a home for items allegedly bought with a stolen credit card, saying factors including the possible presence of drugs and a weapon made the officers' level of force necessary.

Ankeny Police Chief Gary Mikulec also announced a total of 14 felony charges and seven misdemeanor charges against six people tied to the credit card theft and the search.

The case is prompting national questions over whether the officers, wearing body armor and carrying rifles, employed excessive force when they used a battering ram to force open a side door into the house.

Mikulec said police had to consider that people inside the house might be watching on outdoor surveillance cameras as they approached.

"I worry less about violent history as I do about the fact that people on methamphetamine are not real predictable. Our intelligence told us they possibly had drugs and they had access to weapons," he said of the Jan. 30 search in east Des Moines.

Justin Ross, 24, who lives at the house police entered, has been highly critical of how the search warrant was executed. He was in the bathroom when police entered the house.

According to a search warrant filed at Polk County District Court, Ross possessed a black, semi-automatic pistol with a full magazine, red folding knife and 1.7 grams of methamphetamine.

Police arrested Ross Wednesday evening, charging him with two drug-related felonies. He posted bond after spending about 45 minutes in jail, according to online records.

The officers handcuffed the four people in the house, including Ross. Two of the people found in the home, Richard F. Adair and Miranda Scigliano, were charged.

Officers also found 4.8 grams of methamphetamine, a gram of marijuana and other drug paraphernalia in the house, according to a search warrant. Police found 2 grams of meth in Scigliano's purse, the warrant said.

Another man, Randy Williams Jr., 25, was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of stealing a wallet from a woman at an Ankeny clinic. Williams told police during an interview in January that Adair took the wallet, which had the woman's credit cards in it, from him, Mikulec said.

Ankeny police and the Suburban Emergency Response Team made the right decision in sending officers into the house quickly after nobody answered the door, Mikulec said. Though the warrant was connected to a nonviolent crime, Adair had an outstanding warrant for intent to deliver methamphetamine, he said.

Scigliano had an outstanding warrant for operating while intoxicated and possession of a controlled substance, according to the warrant. Both Adair, 35, and Scigliano, 27, can be seen in a video of the search running and hiding as police enter the house.

Police also made their decision knowing that Ross has a permit to carry a firearm, according to the search warrant. Williams, the man who allegedly stole the wallet, told police that Ross had surveillance cameras and could watch them from the home's basement.

Ross this week criticized police for tearing out a camera mounted on the house. Ross installed the cameras to protect vehicles in the driveway from robberies and vandalism, he said.

Taking the camera out, however, was a choice the officer made to ensure other officers' safety, Mikulec said. A camera can give away officers' positions during a search, and law enforcement cannot necessarily tell where the video feed is being viewed from, he said.

"We knew there were possible weapons, we knew there were bad people, we knew they didn't want to be apprehended," he said. "It didn't look pretty, but we had to pull the camera off the wall."

Berger, however, said the chief's argument doesn't justify how the raid was handled. Ross and his mother were allowing Adair and Scigliano to stay in the home and were unaware of the outstanding arrest warrants, he said.

Officers did not give Ross enough time to answer their knocks on the door and the house's outside walls before officers burst in, Berger said. Adair's prior warrant for meth distribution also does not appear to rise to the level of needing a heavily armed team, he said.

Adair "was not federally indicted, which usually speaks to the small size of the case," he said. "That does not justify the use of a SWAT team and battering the door down without announcing, in my opinion."

Ross this week said he was frustrated the police didn't simply knock on the door and wait for an answer.

Officers damaged doors that were forced open during the search as they looked for people inside rooms. Mikulec said Wednesday that people subjected to such searches can turn to an insurance company for help or file a claim with the city.